Ideas for Civ6: Taxes and Resources

[Pavo1313]

I realized that after trying Civilization V and being disappointed with it, I became a little obsessed over what I would do to make an amazing Civilization VI. I decided to write up my ideas and share them and see what other think. The results have been split up and placed in several posts like the one below.



Taxes – The tax slider should be reconstituted with income, science, and cultural sliders. Additionally, these should add up to an overall tax rate that is inversely related to happiness in cities. The degree of unhappiness caused by taxation could be moderated by government civics and whether or not a settlement is a city or a colony. Any money that is not taxed should be used to buy luxury resources which brings me to…

Resources – The switch in Civ5 to ensure that one resource provided for on unit was a good one but I would take it farther so that one happiness resource could only make one city happy. The price any city paid for any resource would vary based upon supply and demand curves, which would make some resources more valuable than others. The premise of this economy would be that every city would take whatever money it could devote to purchasing luxuries and buy as much happiness as it could. In addition to natural resources, the game could introduce many artificial resources such as books or electronics that are produced when great merchants or other great people found companies in cities.

This system could be made more interesting still if every resource traced the path from its source to its destination and provided some fraction of its value to every city it passed through or near. Resources would tend to use waterways for transport, as those have historically been cheaper. This creates the possibility of wealthy trade cities if certain cities manage to be placed on pathways of many trade routes. Think New York after the Erie Canal was complete or Chicago once all the railroads ran through it, or Singapore, which sits on the Strait of Malacca.

 

[Camikaze]

I'm not entirely sure that a return to the sliders would work all that well without a serious rebalance and change of some mechanics, but I guess the concept of them was quite good. However, I'm not sure giving a happiness penalty in response to tax is really a necessary or good idea.

The resources idea is quite good though, I think. At least in principle. Resources that are finite and have effects dependent on how many you have makes good sense and would be something I would also like to be added into the game.

The trade system you suggest is quite an interesting one, but it could perhaps be open to abuse, if the benefit derived for the cities along the trade route didn't subtract from the total benefit at the destination. You'd purposefully try and get resources from as far away as possible, because you'd get bonus happiness in every city along the way.

 

[Pavo1313]

You're right that it would be massively abused if the transit bonus was simply added on top of the cost of the resource. The transit would have to be a certain chunk of the total cost spent on a luxury that was sent to transit cities rather than the city that produced the resource.

I haven't decided yet whether the transit costs taken out are just something like 25% of the value of the resource or if there is a certain amount added depending on the distance traveled and that is simply added to the cost the buyer has to pay. It would give buyers an incentive to shop locally. It's unclear if that's a good thing.

In any case, an economist would have to program this. I tried to figure out the supply and demand equations that could be to price luxuries and failed, but I feel like it should be possible because people manage to price resources in real life.

 

[Camikaze]

If we put it in terms of gold for ease of example, then if a resources gives 4 gold, and has to pass through 5 cities on the way to its destination, you could have it so that the first city it passes through gets 1 gold, then the next city gets .75 gold, then the third city gets .625, the fourth .46875, the fifth .3515625 and the destination city gets the remainder; 1.0546875. This would incentivise sourcing locally, and could add a nice economic element to the game. The problem would be if it meant a whole lot of boring and tedious micromanagement and calculations, but hopefully it'd at least be intuitive.

 

[mj31311]

I think having a tax system would improve the game. Not the 'budget' sliders like there were in IV and III just a single tax slider. It could effect happiness as well as economic growth. For example having certain marks on the slider that would effect the GNP; like when the tax rate reaches 50% you get less income from trade routes because people can't spend as much since the government is taking more of their money. And make it tied to social policies so that a more social government would be able to bear higher taxes etc.

If the game ever brought back corporations (which i wish it would honestly) they could have a seperate tax bar.

I love your resource idea that would make the economic aspect of the game much more interesting and even educational.

 

[That nerdy kid]

on the resources: then each resource would have to give a lot more, because on higher difficulties its hard to have positive happiness even without this change

 

[Colonel]

I really do like the idea of a tax slider but I would want it slightly more complicated. You need an overall tax rate slider then allocation sliders. Thus no matter how much or little you collect X% could always go to R&D, X% to military, X% culture\civic programs, X% to treasury as a surplus. We could also work in a deficit system into an equation like this which I would love.

 

[seasnake]

Two words for you: Paradox games.

You want deficit spending, loans, and all the joys of balancing a GDP? They're your guys. Whatever comes into Civ will need to be much more streamlined. The OP's simpler suggestion is much more likely.

 

[Ecivlover]

Although I personally like civ5 your ideas are great ideas. I think the best way to do that resource allocation would be to have your leftover money spent to make that city happy. Your empire would have different demand/happiness levels and certain supply levels for each resource. Then it would take a certain amount of money to move the resource based on distance and travel method cheaper on rivers and railways then on roads. So each city would use the money it has as efficiently as it can to buy as many resources as it can. This would be hard to program and hard to understand at first but that is were civ5 excels just automate it and then allow manual change. I also agree with a complex multi slider tax system. Although it would be to complex for most just automate it so only those that want to mess with it need to.

 

[JWAT44]

If we put it in terms of gold for ease of example, then if a resources gives 4 gold, and has to pass through 5 cities on the way to its destination, you could have it so that the first city it passes through gets 1 gold, then the next city gets .75 gold, then the third city gets .625, the fourth .46875, the fifth .3515625 and the destination city gets the remainder; 1.0546875. This would incentivise sourcing locally, and could add a nice economic element to the game. The problem would be if it meant a whole lot of boring and tedious micromanagement and calculations, but hopefully it'd at least be intuitive.

you could fix the micromanagement by allowing the player to have specific advisors execute the players objectives. example: tell the military advisor to capture a city and then he tries to do what he can to capture the city (i wouldnt trust the ai in warfare though) or you could have the science advisor focus research on technologies that improve the military or economy. you would give the advisor the resources you feel they need (science just has science points so no need for him) to accomplish the task. for capturing a city you could give the military advisor some troops and some gold and he tries to take the city. you could have the diplomatic advisor try to obtain a certain resource and give them the gold they need to get it and you can stop the advisor from what they are doing any time you want and retake total control. maybe as you earn more great people in a specific category that category's advisor would improve their ability to complete objectives. (great artist-diplomatic, great general-military, great engineer/great merchant-economic, and science wouldnt need a skill level because they are just doing specific research orientation)

 

[fleitner]

you could fix the micromanagement by allowing the player to have specific advisors execute the players objectives. example: tell the military advisor to capture a city and then he tries to do what he can to capture the city (i wouldnt trust the ai in warfare though) or you could have the science advisor focus research on technologies that improve the military or economy. you would give the advisor the resources you feel they need (science just has science points so no need for him) to accomplish the task. for capturing a city you could give the military advisor some troops and some gold and he tries to take the city. you could have the diplomatic advisor try to obtain a certain resource and give them the gold they need to get it and you can stop the advisor from what they are doing any time you want and retake total control. maybe as you earn more great people in a specific category that category's advisor would improve their ability to complete objectives. (great artist-diplomatic, great general-military, great engineer/great merchant-economic, and science wouldnt need a skill level because they are just doing specific research orientation)

My first thought after reading this was: You should play the Europa Universalis games (if you have not already anyway)

I have all Civs as well as a couple of Paradox games. Although I like both types, my favorite are the Civ games because they have much less micromanagement. The only real gripes I have with the Civ games are: Civ3: pollution and Civ5: only playable on marathon.

 

[JWAT44]

My first thought after reading this was: You should play the Europa Universalis games (if you have not already anyway)

I have all Civs as well as a couple of Paradox games. Although I like both types, my favorite are the Civ games because they have much less micromanagement. The only real gripes I have with the Civ games are: Civ3: pollution and Civ5: only playable on marathon.

what are the europa universalis games about? (obviously set in europe ) because ive seen them mentioned a couple times on these forums

 

[fleitner]

what are the europa universalis games about? (obviously set in europe ) because ive seen them mentioned a couple times on these forums

These games are massive strategy games, I mostly played EU3 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_Universalis_III).

Despite the name, the game world is the full world, including an insane amount of nations (wikipedia says something like 300) and an even more insane amount of provinces. You can play as major France, or as small Saxony (or China, or native American/African nations), depending on preference. And you can micromanage almost every aspect in game - army/fleet composition (lead by a general/admiral of your choice, with individual strengths) and size (big armies are stronger, but are tougher to supply), province improvements, taxes, research, full scale diplomacy (e.g. Royal Marriage in order to inherit another empire. Of course it might be other empires don't like it, or married another daughter and claim the throne as well - Civ diplomacy is a shame compared to it) - the full lot.

The most obvious differences are of course round based vs real time, and in EU3 the provinces and their resources are fixed, so you can't just place a city where ever you want.

EU3 is a great game, however I prefer the more streamlined Civ games (in general, not only Civ5). But if you want total control and ability to micromanage all aspects of your empire at will - EU is your game (it's £9.99 on steam, less at Amazon, so if you search/wait for a good deal it might be less than 5 quids)

 

[Camikaze]

I think telling your military advisor to capture a city and them doing it for you would be going a little too far in terms of automation...there still has to be things in the game that you yourself do. The issue with micromanagement I'm talking about is if you had to personally calculate all your trade routes to see if City A should take from Source B or Source C, and whether City B should then take from Source B or Source D. That would suck.